Method of and means for mechanical indexing.



A. R. FERGUSSON.

METHOD OF AND MEANS FOR MECHANICAL INDEXING.

APPLICATION FILED JAN.2, 1918.

1 2 934 Patented July 2, 1918.

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APPLICA 1 ,%?0,93% Patented July 1918.

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Lar ner.

To all whom it may concern,

Be it known that I, draw 1R. lEnReUssoN, a citizen of the United States, residing at New. York, in the county of New York, and

State of New York, have invented certain new and useful llmprovement's'in Methods of and Means for Mechanical Indexing, of which the following is the. specification.

This invention relates to a method of recording and indexing and is especially a plicable for making a permanent record of any name, which record accompanies the name. and is upon itsface the means whereby it can'be located or placed in a file instantly at any timev thereafter. More particularly,

the invention consists in-firsttranslating any name into a number, according to a predetermined plan; in then recording each resulting number in-a certain color upon a separate sheet or card, the coloralso being determined by said predetermined plan, and then arranging said sheets or cards according to the value and color of the numbers thereon. My new. system is especially adapted to the recording of exceedingly large listsof names, such for example as those occurring in the telephone directory of a large city, in large mail order houses, and the like, with-- out the confusion that would result if such lists were attempted to be indexed according to the ordinary methods. my new system each name is translated into a number, according to a predetermined plan, and which translation is times taking t e place of the name, the number in'itself and by itself .conveying all the information requislte to dealers of the name and the .key and guide, and to. all future dealers with anaccoulit'on record. .Also the number shows "upon its face instantly the a place in the'file where the name will belocated.. Furthermore I dispense entirely with thenecessity of an retranslation into letters, thereby maln'ng 1t posslble ,to dlvlde the alphabetinto three parts, using a triple series of numbers,'ass1gn1ng a difierent color to each series as a resudt of which the names willbe filed both numerically and alphabetl cally, enormously simplifying the system andand making it possible to use a smgle digit for each letter of the alphabet.-

,ong the objects of my invention is to a so simplify ,the question of indexing that not only may large lists of names be quickly indexed,-but the names wlll at thesame time permanent, the number for all.

nnrn on or n iunnn'sron iuncnnn'rcnr run me.

cessible without necessitating any previous consultation or study of indexes or the like; v further to greatly increase the aocuracy of filing, refiling, and recording; further to provide a system wherebyevery person may have a special number which will be permanentlyi attached to and be as immutable as his name, so that whereventhat individual maybe, the 'same number willfollow and ber; further toprint each individuals number or name, or both, en the ndex. card-in a of the surname according to a predetermined 'plan; further to locate the position of the name in the. index cards to within three successive letters of the alphabet by referring to the number on the card, and then 10- cate the exact letter of the alphabet by referring to the color in which the number is printed on the index card; also to further subdivide by making use of diderent colored tabs in the spaces under-leach letter of the the numbers'representing the names will be in proper sequence and at the same time the names will fall in their ]proper alphabetical order, thus making-possi le n indexing systemcombining sequence in both numerical and alphabetical arrangement; and such further objects, advantages and capabilities as will later more fully appear.

Referring to the drawingsz. Figure 1, represents a keyboard of a type- I writer, said keyboard being arranged according to my present invention, lFig; Zis a perspective view ofa printin hammer and key of-af typewriter equipp for pfintingmards-for use in my new index- 1L1 system, I v V -'Fig. 3 and color values of each of the letters of the alphabet can be seen at a glance. f Figs. 4 and 5 are indexing elements constructed according to my present invention.

, atented tr iya, lei. Application'filed January a, rare. serralnaaiaioa,

arranged alphabetically; further'toclasi slfy entirely by number and color in such 1 way as. to make any name immediately aceo we apply to him and he can always be identified in correspondance, by wire,etc., by this numcolor to be determined from the first letter a alphabet whereby the alphabetical arrange;

is a chart on whichthe numerical let Fig. 6 is a perspective View of an index drawer in which theindexmgelements are arranged in accordance with my present ill-.- vention,

are"

Fig. 7 is a modification of the arrangement in the index drawer of Fig. 6.

This invention is an improvement over,

the indexing system disclosed in my Patent No. 1,234,320. In the patent just referred to the al habet is divided into a plurality of series 0 numbers running from 1 to 9, the particular arrangement and relation between the letters and numbers being represented therein as follows:

By ascertainin this relation between the letters of the alp abet and the numbers assigned thereto, which maybe done by merely writing" the name with its corresponding number on a typewriter equipped with the key section and hammer shown in Fig. 2, any name of a large list to be indexed can be quickly transposed into its corresponding numbers, it, however, not being necessary to transpose all the letters of the name, but merely a selected number,-such for example, as the initials, and first two and last two letters of the surname, or any other desired number of the letters. These numbers, as is disclosed in my said patent, are placed upon an indexing card and thus furnish means for quickly finding or pllacin said card in its proper place in t drawer.

By the relative arrangement of the letters and numbers as used in my above mentioned patent, and which arrangement is set forth herein above, the numbers interpreted from the name by the typewriter and filed in se uence would place the names alphabetica ly in great irregularity. Also in any other arrangement of letters and numbers, except as hereinafter suggested, the numbers would be in sequence, but the alphabet irregular. The following arrangement of letters and numbers, however, when the numbers were in proper sequence, would bring the first letter of the name in ap roxi-,

mate but not accurate alphabetical or er.

asonnrenr 111222333 JKLMNOPQR 444555666 s 'r vwxYz 77788899 However, while the above arrangement with numbers filed in perfect'sequence will automatically bring the first letter of the 7 names beginning with ABC before those beginning with DEF, it will not insure e in exing any alphabetical regularity ;for example, the name Ball (whose number according to the last proposed arrangement would be 1144) would be filed before Allen (whose number according to the last mentioned system would be 1425,the numbers corresponding to the first two and last two letters being used.)

In order to obviate this diiiiculty and bring the names in the indexing system in proper alphabetical order, as well'as in numerical sequence, I propose an arrangement of letters, numbers and colors automatically produced by the typewriter. This will furthermore prevent duplication of numbers. In the plan of my patent referred to above the number combinations must be made up from a base of nine digits, 1, to 9,that is, nine elements to work into combinations enough to'produce all the names in the world. As these nine digits are used in combination three times to provide the twenty-six letters of the alphabet with numbers, it is an obvious fact that duplication of numbers will occur representing different names. In order to prevent this, we must have as many elements of numbers as there are letters in the alphabet. To accomplish this, I employ three distinct colors, preferably red, green and blue, and apply the numbers and colors to the letters as indicated in Fig. 3 of the drawing, it being here pointed out that in this figure the vertical section lines represent red, the horizontal section lines representing blue, and the slanting section lines representing green. This particular selection of direction of section lines to represent the various colors will be adhered to throughout this specification, and is also made use of in Figs. 1, 2, 6 and 7 in addition to Fig. 3. I It is thus seen that according to the present invention, the arrangement of the letters, numbers and colors is as follows A B 0 D E F Red Green Blue Red Green Blue 1 1 1 2 2 2 G H I J K L Red Green Blue Red Green Blue,. 3 3 v 3 4 4 4 etc.

to differentiate between the two as in standard alphabetical files, or a distinctive mark might be assigned.

Q three colors, in order to ar est in carrying into use this arrangement of letters and numbers in combination with produce twenty-six indexing elements, I make use oi a specially arranged. typewriter, the he *board arrangement of which is illustrate in Fig. *1 and the printing hammer in Fig. 2, it bein here pointed out that such typewriter may e an ranged to' print each letter and its corresponding number simultaneousl or separately as desired. Referring to Fig. 1, it will be seen that the keyboard of this typewriter which I propose to use has the upper surface of each of the keys colored in order to carry out the color scheme referred to above ;-for example, the key having the letter Q, and its corresponding number 6 is colored een as'indicated by the slanting section lines, which. color is also applied to the keys having the letters W and E, as well as others, while the key having the letter R as indicated by the horizontal section lines I is colored blue,'a nd the key carrying the letter Y, as indicated by the vertical section lines, is colored red;'this idea being carried out to apply appropriately to each of the keys of the typewriter.

The particular rela tion between the. letters,

. will, as pointed out above,- be ascertained at gree thereforel' she throws the ribbon shift to &

a lance from the chart illustrated in Fig. 3.

- T is typewriter will be provided with a three color ribbon, green, blue and red, with the usual shift that enables the writing in any one of the three colors.

without the colors, be filed before the name Allen; Balls number being 11:44:, and Allens number, by selecting the first two letters, and

the last two, M25. N ow by using the color system and the typewriter just referred to,

the person operating the typewriter sees when starting to write the name Fall that the B hey of the typewriter is n,

green an writes the whole number 1141A in green. Wl hen she goes to write the name Allen, she sees that the A key (A being the Allen (red) first letter of the name) is red,--theretore, sheshifts the ribbon and writes the number .1425 entirely in red. New by noting the color arrangement of the numbers, it will at once be seen that A is red and comesbetore B which is green.

Attention is now called to Fig. 6, in which it will be seen that the card bearing the name would be filedunder A.1 (red numberB? 14:25. Also the card bearing the name all (green) whose number is 114%- (green number) would be filed under the section 18-]. (green). llt will thus be seen that there is a perfect sequence oi numbers under each letter. It might be that there would be, for example, three ditlerent names each number 103%. Hon ca er each will be of a ditlbrent color, and would-consequently numbers and colors llt has been pointed out above that the name Ball would,

cording to a predetermined filed under A-l (r d);

G1 (blue). Duplications of numbers in lB-1 (green) and v the same file section are impossible and the names will be in alphabetical order and the "bearing the color green and one'bearing the color blue has been placed to sub-divide the section between A-1 and lBl. This feature of sub-dividing may be successfully carried to "any further degree desired b an appropriate arrangement and location 0 the colors. v.

As ointed out above the letters selected from t e name being indexed, for transposition into numbers may be the initials and the first two and last two letters of the name,

or any other particular combination desired, the inventive idea still being the same regardless of the particular letters chosen for translation into numbers. Also if desired, the numbers may be grouped in such a manner that certain of them may represent file units, as for'exam'ple, one or more of said numbers could represent the particulanfilmg section, another one or more the partlcular cabinet, another one or more the drawer, and

so on.

Having now described my invention l cla1m:-

1. An indexing element bearing numerical digits between 1' and 9 inclusive, each letter of a selected number of the letters forming the name indexed being represented by a single digit between 1 and 9 inclusive, and i said numerical digits appearing on said in a given color selected ac.-

plan.

- 2. An indexing element bearing numerical digits between 1 and 9 inclusive, each dexing element in a letter of a selected number of the letters forming the name indexed being represented by a single digit between 1 and 9 inclusive, and said numerical digits being formed on said indexing element in a certain one of a plurality of colors, the particularcolor used being chosen according to a 'predetermlned lan. p 3. An indexing element, bearing numerical rat digits between 1 and 9 inclusive, each'letter of a selected number of the letters forming the name indexed being represented by a single digit between 1 and 9 inclusive, varying significance being assigned to numbers by color Variation according to a predeter mined plan and all of said digits being formed on said indexing element of the particular color belonging to the first digit of the number being indexed.

4. An indexing element bearing two sets of characters comprising the name being in-- dexed and a number, said number i being 1 made up of digits between 1 and 9 inclusive,

each letter of a selected number of the letters of said name being represented in said number by a single digit between 1 and 9,

and. one of said sets of'characters being printed on said card in one of a plurality of colors, the particular color used being chosen according to a predetermined plan, the location of the indexing element in the index drawer being determined both by its numerical value as well as its color.

5. The method of indexing which consists in transforming the name being indexedvinto a numerical number made up of digits between 1 and 9, each of saiddigits representing one letter of a selected number of the letters of said name, placing said name and said number on an indexin element, elther the number or name, or th,

being formed in a color determined by a predetermined plan from the first letter of the name, and arranging a plurality of said elements according to number and'color.

6". An indexing element bearing numerical digits between 1 and 9 inclusive, each letter of a selected number of the letters forming the name indexed being represented by a single digit between 1 and 9 inclusive, and

said numerical digits appearing on said in-' of colors, the particular color used being determined by a predetermined plan,'whereby said name may be quickly indexed according to both'numerical and alphabetical sequence.

8. An indexing element bearing numerical digits, each letter of a selected number of letters forming the name indexed being represented by a single digit, and said numerical, digits appearlng on said indexing,

element in a given color selected according to a predetermined plan.

In witness whereof I hereunto subscribe name to this specification in the presence i mfy 0 two wltnesses.

Witnesses:

LUGILLE FLU ART, LOIS A. NEEL.

ALAN RoBBFEReUsson 

